All still to play for – Neville

Jan 25 2008 by Ian Doyle, Liverpool Daily Post

PHIL NEVILLE believes Everton cannot afford to wallow in their Carling Cup semi-final defeat as they have “everything to play for” between now and the end of the season.

The Goodison Park outfit’s hopes of reaching a first major final in 13 years were dashed by a second-leg defeat to Chelsea on Wednesday night.

Joe Cole’s solitary goal consigned David Moyes’s side to a 1-0 reverse on the night and a 3-1 aggregate defeat.

However, Everton remain firmly in the hunt for fourth place and have a tie against Norwegian champions SK Brann to come next month for a berth in the last 16 of the UEFA Cup.

And skipper Neville is upbeat about the team’s fortunes for the final four months of the campaign – and reckons this can be the start of a new chapter for the club.

“I think we are getting better and improving as a team,” said the England international.

“I said in the dressing room after the game, this is not the end. This is the beginning. The beginning of playing in games like this where the pressure is really on and making sure we go out there and enjoy it. We’ve still got fourth place to play for and the UEFA Cup, so let’s make it a great end to the season and not wallow in defeat, although this does hurt.”

Neville added: “This can’t be a negative. We have to take all the positives out of this Carling Cup run. We’ve changed the perception of what people think of us, teams are respecting us more now. We must make this the start to a great end of the season. We have Tottenham and Blackburn coming up next week, which are two massive games.

“In my previous two seasons at the club, around this time we have had nothing to play for. Now we have everything to play for. Every game seems like a cup final, and for me in particular that’s what I want, that’s the level I want to be playing in football.

“No-one likes to lose a semi-final. But as we said after the Arsenal and Manchester United games in the league, big games are decided by small percentages.”

Moyes faces a selection headache for Everton’s next game against Tottenham Hotspur on Wednesday.

Already without Yakubu, Joseph Yobo and Steven Pienaar due to Africa Cup of Nations commitments, the Goodison Park manager will also be unable to call on Tim Cahill or Tony Hibbert for the Premier League visit of the Londoners.

Hibbert picked up his fifth booking of the season in the 2-1 win over Wigan Athletic on Sunday and, with Cahill following suit during Wednesday night’s Carling Cup defeat, both are subsequently banned for next week’s game.

Neville and Pienaar have accrued four cautions, and a further booking before the yellow card amnesty at the end of February would see them also incur a one-match suspension.

Meanwhile, Roma midfielder Ricardo Faty claims he turned down a move to Everton before joining Nantes on loan.

The 21-year-old failed to settle at the Stadio Olimpico after joining from Strasbourg in the summer of 2006, and has returned to France on loan until the end of the season with a view to a permanent move.

But Faty, who spent first half of this season on loan with Bayer Leverkusen, said: “In England, Everton were very interested in taking me.

“Like Leverkusen they watched me in the Under-21 Toulon Festival. But as they did not see me playing in the last six months, they wanted to see if I had kept the rhythm. And they proposed me a 15-day trial, like they are used to doing there. But I did not want to take this risk as it could not have ended in a contract.”